Dagor Dagorrath Delivery Service
by Lasgalendil
Summary: "If you're like me—if you stumbled across this trying to find a way to send someone back to Middle-earth—then congratulations. You're either insane or you've actually had an encounter." For Dagor Dagorrath to work in his favor, the Elves and Dwarves must remain enemies. Rather than letting Legolas and Gimli ever reach Valinor, Melkor sends them someplace unexpected.
1. Don't say I didn't warn you

The day the package arrived in the mail, I didn't think much of it.

Hi. I'm Lydia Pinkerton, by the way. If you're like me, the internet—and its multitudes of fanfiction—were the first place you turned for help. So if you're looking for some cheap online entertainment, just hit the back button. You'll find all the slash and smut and hurt/comfort fics or Durincest or whatever the hell you're into on your previous window. But if you're like me—if you stumbled across this trying to find a way to send someone back to Middle-earth—then congratulations. You're either insane or you've actually had an encounter…and are clinging desperately to the remnants of your sanity.

Don't worry. The sanity will all be over soon.


	2. An Unexpected Arrival

The day the packaged arrived, I didn't think much of it.

It actually sat unopened for the longest time on the table by the front door. I just assumed Sarah had ordered it. But she was gone, in Europe for the summer working on her thesis, so it was just me all alone. We must've had what, a dozen Skype conversations, before I remembered to bring it up.

"A package came for you."

"Who from?"

"No idea. No return address." That should've been my first cause for suspicion. No return address, no name, no sender, just addressed to our apartment.

"Then how do you know it's for me?" She asked.

"'Cause I haven't ordered anything recently, dummy," I told her. "So it's obviously yours."

"It can't be too important, then," she shrugged. "We can open it now, or just wait 'til I get back. I really don't care." But we quickly moved onto other things—and by other things I mean it's our sex life and it's private so no, you're not getting a play-by-play narration or vibrator setting recommendations. You want porn, just browse the Sherlock tag on AO3.

The box continued to gather dust.

It did, however, happen to have a near nightly propensity for falling off the table-stand. I thought this was weird, but maybe Mycroft (yes, Sarah has a cat named Mycroft—can you think of anything more suiting?) had taken a fancy too it. Eventually I got bored of the morning ritual of replacing it so on the floor it sat.

Every once in awhile it'd be flipped over, or seemed to have scooted across the room on its own, powered, no doubt, by batting kitty paws. "Having fun with your new favorite toy?" I asked him probably around a month later, finding him guarding the plain cardboard box in full ninja stance.

…I was wrong. Mycroft fucking _hated_ that thing.

I know. I know. That should've been my second clue.


	3. An Unwelcome Guest

"Honey, I have something to tell you—" Sarah bit her lip several evenings later.

"Oh, dear God," I sat heavily. "You're breaking up with me via Skype—?"

"What?" She jumped up half-way across the world. "No!"

Might as well ham it for all it's worth. "You're pregnant?"

"As if!" she snorted. "I—they—"

"They offered you a PhD position." I finished for her, feeling both elated and dead inside.

"Yes!" she lit up and began babbling away about how great it was and that she'd be able to study right where Tolkien and Lewis and all the Inklings had all hung out at the Bird. I was sort of a fan—I mean, they're both staples of fantasy/science fiction literature, sure—but not the sort who'd read any of their works more than once or twice, not a real fan of the movies but they were palatable enough (as long as Sarah wasn't sitting next to me with scathing commentary), and the only reason there were multiple copies of their entire published opus in my house was because I happened to live with Sarah. She was one of those überfans, you know, went to things like RingCon, got her photograph with Richard Taylor, actually got an autograph from Christopher Lee before he _lived happily ever after forever and never died,_ as Sarah always insists tearfully. But in addition to that, she's also one of those weirdos in constant contact with people with really weird, European sounding names who run Tolkien language web-sites in Italian and German and invent freakin' Neo-Khuzdul, for crying out loud. I mean, the girl publishes original poetry and makes translations in _Quenya._

So needless to say I'd never understand her excitement, but it was hers, and it was something she loved, and even if it meant she'd be gone for a few years instead of months and I might have to move to God-forsaken Europe, I was happy.

We chatted, made dinner together, popped corks off champagne bottles from different time zones, stayed up way past midnight (Central Time, at least, it was morning where she was) then went to bed alone.

…I woke up the next morning with a disturbingly life-like miniature Legolas covered in cat spit on my pillow.


	4. The Mewlips Feed

"Gross!" I shouted. "Mycroft!" But he was just sitting there, looming menacingly, as if daring the thing to move. I picked it up gingerly, took it to the bathroom and rinsed the strings of cat mucous off.

It didn't look familiar. Sarah's got a lot of nerd memorabilia sitting around the house but this one I couldn't quite place. I'd seen enough cheap, corporate merch and the custom-painted or original pieces to know the difference from the many cons Sarah insisted on dragging me to. And this thing looked _expensive._ Like, not a kid's toy. Not an action figure. Not a "collectible", but a genuine piece of goddamned _art._

"Shit, Mycroft," I told the still yowling cat, "if you've even ruined a multi-thousand dollar sculpture I will shave you, swear to God."

He only hissed at me.

I laid the figure carefully in my dresser where Mycroft couldn't get it, and thought no more of it.

An hour later, I discovered the Legolas didn't arrive alone. I found a Gimli and the remnants of a suspiciously familiar cardboard box in the entry way as I was on my way to work and had no time to clean it up.

"Godammit, Mycroft!" I shouted, picking up the figurine and shutting it in a drawer. "You're going to be bald as a baby's backside when I get home!"

I got home fifteen hours later, threw my keys in the bowl, fed the damned cat, and went promptly to bed. And if I stepped on a Legolas figure and swore to myself while shoving it back in my dresser without wondering how the hell the cat had managed to get to it, my excuse is I was just too tired to care.


	5. The Cat of Queen Berúthiel

Some ungodly hour after midnight I woke abruptly, startled awake by the sounds of a cat, apparently dying.

"Mycroft!" I shouted, flinging my covers off. "Mycroft!" I hated the little turdwipe, but he meant so much to Sarah, and I'm sure I'd bawl too if he'd slipped out of the house and got hit or eaten by raccoons or something.

I raced downstairs towards the sounds of his screeching, convinced he'd slipped out a window or something and was battling opossums in the dark. But no, the damned cat was thrashing about the living room, yowling and shrieking like I've never heard a cat before. I was half-convinced he was dying, half-convinced something had snuck _in_ through the screens somehow. I shouted and called and chased him around in the dark to no avail.

I stumbled over him, earning yet another hiss and howl, and finally found the wall and light switch.

…and there in the entry-way lay Legolas, the cat-spit covered figurine, his head being gnawed.

"Goddamnit, Mycroft!" I pulled the damn cat back, earning myself complimentary scratches to the hands, face, and boobs. "It's just a fucking toy! If you hate it so damned much why bother!" He dropped it, though, with some yelling and shaking and not a few bites to my fingers. I let him go the minute I had Legolas, but that damned cat chased me into the kitchen where I threw (alright, laid gently) the stupid statue into the silverware and slammed the drawer shut (carefully).

He swiped me a few good ones across the ankles, hackles raised, spitting mad, before I managed to grab the squirt bottle and lit his little kitty world on fire. "BAD CAT BAD CAT BAD CAT—!"

Sarah hated negative reinforcement, said it was the worst way to try to teach humans or animals manners, that it was cruel and unnecessary, but damnit, Sarah wasn't there at the moment, and it wasn't animal abuse if the damned thing was outright attacking you. Eventually he turned tail and ran, and I'm embarrassed to say I wasn't above a few well-aimed parting shots.

So there I was, panting in the kitchen, arms, legs, neck, face, and boobs scratched to hell, blood all over me, little bloody paw prints everywhere, and puddles of water all over the floor. I let my weapon clatter to the floor, and helped myself to a generous serving of an entire Ben and Jerry's carton glumly surveying the damage from my perch on the sink. Wasn't this just _swell._

It took nearly an hour to clean up, and by that time I was sweaty and gross and decided to shower and by the time that was over I only had like an hour until I had to get up, anyways. I decided to hell with it, though, and went back to bed.

I couldn't sleep. Or rather, what little sleep I did get was restless. In my nightmares I was chased by a bigger, maniacal version of Mycroft, shooting at me with a spray-gun filled with acid water as the house dissolved and melted around us. I woke with a start, and couldn't get relaxed again no matter how hard I tried.


End file.
